of looking at it i was really surprised. this is country is not conducive but it's good for secrecy. out of the group of officers who were sent to kibera nine hundred sixty two a small handful is still alive for many years they have been gathering to mark the anniversary of dispatching the first soviet missiles to what's now known as the island of freedom this time the veterans met the commander of the russian rocket troops for you pro-gun old colonel of us. in cuba i was division service chief and there's a good surname in the division where i served we had a general is name was general of. in the end they all posed for pictures against the background of an r twelve missile the soviet union delivered a total of forty two of these missiles to cuba they were able to reach the us territory in six minutes after launch. world that there were. in order to

transport my regiment to the port but they were able we needed eleven seventy carriage trains. with a lifting capacity of sixty tons each. a secret operation to transfer soviet troops to cuba it was code named and there after a town in the north of the soviet union most of the forty thousand troops that took part in that operation was sure they were going to the north. in september nine hundred sixty two field nurses than i needed on sky are found herself on board one of these ships a voyage lasted eighteen days. the idea we were where in passing dresses sticks old shoes and ordinary stockings our men the saw that soldiers and officers were dressed in financial group shuras with small bathroom for soldiers and big one for officers who knew. all the ships that arrived from the soviet union in one nine hundred sixty two were more than this port the service men proudly got

off the ships without hiding their faces alleging that they had arrived in cuba to gather the harvest cause no doubt some of the locals the weaponry was discharged in conditions of top secrecy even today the shooting of films here is forbidden. the former participants of those events who guarded the secret cargoes agreed to speak into cameras only inside their cars this was a real real secret movement sometimes people. dying off the lights of st. barry quiet. the military tried to stop traffic everything but anyway they say this is a secret. world of cuba see yankee no motherland or death. yes yankee no.

local school children know these maters of the cuban revolution by heart they are still wearing pioneer scarves after the cuban revolution they borrowed that symbol from the new ally the soviet union. the morning lineup in school looks more like a military ritual. cuban school children study the events of the past fifty years that history lessons prata telling them about the revolution itself a teacher shows a selection of black and white archive on a monitor the schoolchildren are shown how americans carelessly spent their time in a pre-revolutionary cuba as if they were the masters of their own destiny. to me fidel is the biggest hero of all heroes whom i know because fidel supported the ideas of our independence as he is a revolutionary hero the only person who had to put up resistance to the united states in the time of neo colonialism. the history of the

kievan revolution and the bells rise to power described in the memoirs of witnesses and in photographs today one can find these publications at bookstores in the center of the van and historian thomas d.s. is a frequent guest here some new books including foreign literature and human history have appeared here more recently. this book reminds me of my youth. it was printed in one thousand nine hundred fifty nine and you could usually find these cards in gather an entire collection of these cards in the told the history of the cuban revolution. local historians claim to have been three hundred fifty attempts to assassinate fidel castro the leader of the cuban revolution according to them the cia was the main offender. bortle one of the three hundred fifty six assassination attempts on

fidel's life was supposed to take place in mid september one thousand nine hundred sixty during his visit to the united nations headquarters the thing is there was a poison cigar out that the policeman responsible for the operation refused to obey orders that just a warning that the cia operation in one nine hundred sixty. in one nine hundred sixty one a year before soviet missiles were deployed in cuba the cia had worked out a military operation to bring down fidel's government a group of american trained cuban emigrants landed in cuba's play of pigs so quiet here on the superior forces of fidel castro stopped their offensive by next day they attempt to seize power fails. the bay of pigs was a disaster. it was poorly done and. and kennedy had stopped the. head had stopped. the navy from giving support i mean it was strictly.

the the river rebellious force that when and which was a bad bad move on the part account the place. ever out of though was only twenty when the bay of pigs battle took place little has changed since then. he hasn't been here for forty years but he had no difficulty finding the place where the american sent forces landed. the government forces fought for every millimeter of land after the battle was over one revolutionary soldier wrote. on the sand to mount the victory. back over kauai the most powerful u.s. warship the houston we were sitting over there. it carried a lot of weapons and foodstuffs. fidel arrived here we want to tank with a hundred millimeter gun he fired four or five times at that ship sank and it

tilted and sank this is how we achieved what we wanted hello it was. later the military museum was opened in the bay of pigs devoted to the legendary battle a cuban military plane which took part in the events was installed near the entry there are monuments erected along the road to the bay of pigs dedicated to the soldiers who died in the american bombings. more than eighty cuban revolutionaries died in battles against the invaders the local residents still remember an incident when the invaders tried to burn a bus full of volunteers with napalm the volunteers had come to the bay of pigs to help fidel's government troops. hello hello so good to see you. by my father my brother my sister's husband and my wife's two brothers four together with me here in.

goodbye so long well so long it was great seeing you were not to see you. the soviet union started supplying these planes to cuba shortly after the bay of pigs invasion as a result the most advanced make twenty one fighter jets with trained crew and started patrolling the airspace over the island. through my old friend. have we flown together. how high we used to fly and how fast. yes this was a very good craft it has never failed me. at all in september one thousand nine hundred sixty two ratings and we were ordered to

take these planes to cuba. we didn't feel any danger of course we were so young. because we had been prepared and we were ready for anything in. the soviet u.s. standoff grew more tense every day these top secret shots were taken during nuclear tests at a soviet testing ground at that time very few people thought about the real consequences of a nuclear conflict never before had the world been closer to a third nuclear world war.

to. the. russians would be soon which brightened if you move out soon from finest impression these. nice clean start on t.v. dot com. will there be war on iraq. friend or foe is missile defense offensive where it stopped us election up close and

october twenty second. he believes it's. easy. to see a story. you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realize that everything is our. heart welcome to the big picture.

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kit's office been a submarine commander for twenty years in august nine hundred sixty two he was in charge of one of four submarines left soviet territorial waters for the first time ever they were carrying nuclear arms torpedoes good a commune nothing about the submarines destination until it reached neutral waters . what but a little we didn't know what was in this on the lobe when we opened it after leaving cola bay if we saw the ruse inside even though i remember it the coordinates are two hundred twenty degrees from young mine to cuba now during his eighty two years old he was one of the youngest commanders at the time like all the other commanders he had been told to use every weapon available in the event of a confrontation with the enemy you know you have been authorized to use either nuclear torpedoes or conventional ones. one nuclear torpedo and twenty

conventional torpedos is nothing to sneeze at you know what's weird to be done would amount to three torpedoes salvos. meanwhile the cuban missile crisis was rapidly sliding into his darkest moment when president john f. kennedy was told about soviet nuclear missiles in cuba he decided to declare a naval blockade of the island ships of any kind about to cuba from whatever nation or. wherever found it could take odd hours of offensive weapons be turned back. the so-called hawks among us top military commanders were trying to persuade kennedy to wipe out soviet missile sites in cuba by delivering a first strike the head of strategic air command curtis lemay was the principal advocate of such a solution to the crisis lamaze attitude was. if it's going to war it on a come this is the best time because we had superiority over the soviets in terms

of numbers. and let me let me when they were asked what he would do it cuba he you know what he said he said burn it and he meant it he meant. by late october cuba was ready to face enemy air strikes special shelters had been built in havana and locals had been alerted to the need to start evacuating the city as soon as the signal came through the wall at who were in this strange when we saw american aircraft breaking into our airspace so we also saw american naval vessels approaching our country from this trench a passage leads to what is in effect an underground town a tunnel stretch over hundreds of meters several thousand people could find shelter here in the event of a nuclear attack with the least on the ground troops that we can see the base of a periscope installed and signed. to by now killer recently a by. then they were in duty twenty four seven. on

october the twenty seventh one thousand nine hundred sixty two the world was closer to a nuclear catastrophe than ever before one of the soviet submarines was find out when it surfaced in the south of us to see the sub responded by putting a nuclear talks on full alert and that moment a crew member became aware of u.s. seamen trying to establish contact with the best kept in british warships captains of its key brought the submarine to the surface again. when you're asked to look around and see what was going on what. was there was some confusion on board. as a result the order to fire a nuclear problem torpedo was not given. near. following contact with the americans they stopped firing at the submarine if the situation had dragged on for another two minutes the nuclear torpedo in the first compartment would have been launched marking

a point of no return. because along with this is the torpedo compartment. that appears there were twenty torpedoes including a nuclear one in this torpedo tube book i'm only pretty cool knows right what these handles could have sent the air into the launcher. and this high pressure air injection could fire a self. of one nuclear or five conventional torpedoes all. october the twenty seven thousand nine hundred sixty two was dubbed black saturday that same day there was another incident in cuba a u.s. spy plane was flying over the island photographing soviet rockets it was shot down by the soviet and missile defense system. they have the order and they. obey the order so they shut down. their you too

and this is the engine of the one part of the main part of the engine. they are leaving the on the next it's a crisis. alexander says always one of the offices of the air defense unit there was ordered to destroy target thirty three the plane piloted by rudolph andersen after it was brought down this is over many other offices have been told to get ready for war. as we waited for them to strike back we sort of withdrew into ourselves there was a complete silence your no talking and no emotions. everybody was in anticipation of further events without knowing how it all would work out. at the last moment when tensions and reached their peak the kremlin and the white

house found a compromise. christophe had responded to a us offer a security guarantees for cuba by deciding to have the missiles dismantled when the news reached the cuban leader fidel castro he flew into a rage the decision had been taken to hide his back one of the most seasoned soviet cantinas. went down after talks with castro. when the talks got under way my father received a message from moscow saying that my mother had died my father was in no position to go back after the news had a visible effect on castro people who showed a good deal of compassion for my father he said he respected him for staying behind and i'm sure this helped the talks. the blockade of cuba was lifted and operation got underway to remove the soviet missiles from the island they were being loaded on to upper decks without disguising them in any way the american saw that the russians weren't fooling them those were not mockups of

missiles but real hardware. the key difference job meanwhile gave himself credit for resolving the critical situation that emerged in the wake of the cuban missile crisis a. direct threat of a world thermonuclear war which has emerged in connection with the crisis in the area of the caribbean sea has been diffused. i mean those who were involved in operation were awarded no medals or other distinctions. felt the americans had not been julian pressed by the soviet union's military might he focused his anger on the submariners. he accused them of cowardice because they had failed to reach cuba but there was no point in arguing with him the only. clue in those years even top military leaders couldn't approach crucial the less they have to. tell you is impulsive. when you realize the snap of somebody's fingers will have you travelled under force there was a dreadful experience. later

camped in the rurik yet of the captains of three other submarines experienced many humiliating moments. they weren't given their june for the fact that they had been able to keep their heads in a very difficult situation. and haven't resorted to their right to use nuclear weapons because perceive there was no thanks at all but i'd rather not talk about it i don't want to frame my nerves the commanders had a very hard time yes we were dragged through the mud but what about our subordinates including my crew do you think anybody ever thank them for the eighty day mission. time seems to have come to a standstill here revolutionary posters and linen suspended from ropes showing through the windows. plush american cabriolet is the best reminders of the so-called colonial era before the revolution. drivers make

a special point of avoiding any discussions with foreigners about cuba's current policies not all don't talk to our politics or get out of the here you know no no forget our politics. i live here in cuba you go back to russia but i live here. at a nest of frogger finds it quite difficult to run a private business and be a taxi driver for tourists in cheap billie's days. numerous bans within the country are only part of the story an economic embargo on cuba has been in effect for fifty years already. less than two hundred kilometers separates cuba from the united states that no u.s. made commodities can reach the island. cubans are still crowning the benefits of the revolution despite the embargo and

the difficult economic situation. there's developments fear is present in the streets of havana around. the daughter of the former officer of the cuban army william rockit is about to get married william shows old photos to his future son in law as it tells him about his family one of them features an old friend alexander markov a soviet pilot who took part in the events of the cuban missile crisis. the two offices correspondent for years before the internet came to cuba then they switched to skype. they've yirrkala alex alex how you doing man. hello william how's your family how's life. mine is ok how's your family. ok count visit us sometime. marshner good you know alex now i might come to moscow soon. yeah looking forward

to seeing you in my home village. nothing anywhere bye bye. today the caribbean or cuban missile crisis computer games is popular among those who could be the sons the real participants of the one nine hundred sixty two events now with the help of computer graphics it's possible to imagine how the events could have turned out if the soviet union and the us didn't find a compromise the worst outcome possible a new clear apocalypse. would be accidentally all this looks less realistic in a game than in real life which tells me that anything like that ever occurred in real life they would have been lost or video games. played is left chela chevys the winner of this tournament most of the contestants couldn't make it to the finals when the game begins once again regardless in real life however there is no such

thing as a reset after a nuclear disaster. more news today violence is once again flared up. these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. china corporations are relieved a. culture is that so much of the moment and there's a huge music history on the mark when germany and its mode ahead a little over

a year ago turkey was being hailed as the new leader in model for the muslim world among many turks the. will there be more on the rise. in the form of this missile defense offensive players and stuff u.s. election close to twenty second one arts. sigrid laboratory to mukherjee was able to build a most sophisticated robot which fortunately doesn't sound anything tim's mission to teach the creation why it should care about humans and. this is why you should care only. to see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realize everything you thought. i'm

tom harpur welcome to the big picture. wealthy british stock. market why not. find out what's really happening to the global economy with mike's cause or for a no holds barred look at the global financial headlines tune into a report.